ATLANTA—What opportunities do you see in your market? How are you leveraging those opportunities? We asked two Atlanta commercial real estate heavy hitters for their thoughts on these questions and turned up some noteworthy answers.

"Specifically in Atlanta we are creating jobs again as a region," Thad Ellis, senior vice president of Cousins Properties. "Little office supply is being added or planned to our market. Rental rates have risen to a point of fair returns and rates will continue to rise short of an economic slowdown.

Because of Cousin's access to capital and the experience and knowledge of its team, Ellis says Cousins is able to respond at a very competitive pace to our customers' growth needs. He says, "We are also able to win new business for the same reasons."

Jack Portman, vice president of Portman Holdings, is focused on three primary markets: the US, China and India. In the US, the firm is focused on development opportunities as well as architectural design projects. In an earlier interview, he revealed his biggest career challenge.

"We are particularly excited to see our hometown of Atlanta becoming a hot market again," Portman tells GlobeSt.com "In China, our focus is primarily architecture. In India, we gravitate toward investment and asset management opportunities. We are in the enviable position of being able to choose only those projects that interest us the most...in the world's three hottest markets."

So how is Portman tapping this massive opportunity? He candidly explains that each of the firm's three target markets has its own challenges and economic systems with their own ups and downs and opportunities to evolve.

"One project begets another," Portman says. "We tend to specialize in mixed-use developments where our combination of pragmatism and creativity results in a human environment that creates success, not only for the user but especially for the owner."